https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_religion
Zero citations btw
Full support for government regulation of religion, shit like Scientology or even the JW's should not pass any sane "FDA but for religion"
You're not wrong but I would argue that "normal" religions like Evangelical Christianity are every bit as fucked up as JWs or Scientology, if not moreso.
Most evangelical Christians support the idea of eternal, conscious torment for unbelievers. When I was a Christian I internalized this belief to the point I had a bit of a mental breakdown. I'd argue though that I actually was the totally sane one. I just bothered to spend more than a few seconds dwelling on what eternal torment actually implied. Personally I believe that teaching kids that unbelievers are tormented forever in a lake of fire to be child abuse. At least the JWs believe in annihilation of unbelievers and reject eternal torment, for one.
I'm also speaking from the perspective of a US American and I get that our religions here are not in the same situation as those in other countries.
Edit: ah, I see you're talking more about organizational structures than beliefs.
To a Finnish person whose experience of religion has been the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, American Evangelical Christianity is anything but normal
Any successful communist revolution in the US is going to have to figure out what to do with those damn Mormons and I hope it won't be our War in the Vendee
I feel like religion is fine so long as it doesn't interfere with your grasp of reality.
I don't really care about individual believers or beliefs, it's these frankly evil pyramid scheme organisations I'm after
Western religion is absolutely putrid and totally corrupt. I have zero qualms with people who follow religion for a sense of community or personal liberation and like actually follow the teachings. Like everyone else my problem is with this terrible supply-side Jesus bullshit that's everywhere.
Oh, don't you worry, there's supply side Buddha shit too, that one huge international Japanese Buddhist org springs to mind
People are a bit shit everywhere I'm afraid
Not surprised to hear this honestly. It feels like you have to go out of your way to seek out radical religion.
Oftentimes these types of organisations ARE what people run into when they're seeking out religion though
There were also Zen-Buddhist guides for Japanese soldiers on how to handle the disgusting things they did to Chinese civilians. It was a mechanism to make sure the soldiers didn't refuse orders. Zizek talks about this in the Peterson-debate.
Yeah me too. Organised religion rubs me up the wrong way.
Juche is more or less just socialism applied to specific Korean conditions. One of which being self-sufficiency because of the capitalist world's tendency to try and crush socialist endeavors by blockades, sanctions and embargoes - you know, the thing the US has been doing to the DPRK for decades...
Meanwhile in the US, just try and get "Jefferson Avenue" in your town renamed because Jefferson was a slaver, and see what happens to you.
Imagining a just world where all the foreign weirdos bothering me to babble about Jesus at train stations would be thrown in jail
:comfy-cool:
Love it when they're hanging out near supermarket doors and start to preach at you immediately when you step out. :shrek-pixel-despair:
Dudes with megaphones yelling about eternal damnation really livens up the day
We have that near me, but the added bonus that they're not just standard evangelicals, they're hoteps
See, that's at least novel and interesting
The few times I've had Krishna people talk to me have been a breath of fresh air- thank God, at least it's not Jesus
In countryside North Korea, buses as we know them don’t exist.
Lol
Seemingly all female guides are incredibly beautiful. I don’t believe this to be a coincidence.
Double lol
I hate to say it but similarities between broken, desolate cities in most zombie apocalypse movies just can’t be dismissed
on a picture of a cityscape that would look completely normal in most of the world
You are looking across into South Korea. This open space is the Joint Security Area which straddles the political border within the Demilitarized Zone. The physical border is where the light gravel turns dark denoted by the raised concrete line. Cross that line and you’ll be shot. The blue buildings are halfway in each Korea and by entering them, one can theoretically cross to the South. The large building ahead is the ‘Freedom House’, ironically housing a dozen surveillance cameras.
whoops when you forget that the scary orwellian building youre talking about is actually on the south korean side
Those captions are pure :brainworms: . Imagine going somewhere and seeing it for your own eyes but instead of relaying the conversations you had with the people there and their point of view you just kept repeating the things you assumed were true before you went.
A table laid out for one in an empty restaurant, three waitresses and ten plates of food which I didn’t even put a dent into. Out of every table available, mine faced the Korean state television broadcast. This is no coincidence.
lol. They're trying to lie to me by putting my American ass in front of a TV!
If nothing else the captions are an interesting look at the western propagandised mind.
I added this one. Probably a pretty easy and foolproof way to counter any corporate or other propaganda on Wikipedia.
Do I have to hold hands with anyone and tell them what I'm "thankful" for, because if so I'm out
Makes sense. Like I think about alcoholic anonymous and how they want you to have a higher power, obviously this is a stand-in for god so they don't get slapped as a religious organization. I always had trouble with that, but I can see the secular alternative being your faith in something like Juche or communism broadly.
As someone who used to be religious, I do find a commitment to communism to have a sort of "religious" aspect to it (meaning that in a positive way). Ultimately the whole reason I'm a communist is I believe in the fundamental value of individual people and believe we're all deserving of dignity. I want to see oppressed people lifted up. I want to live in real community with the people around me and wider humanity. I just want a better world. These are things my former religion would pay lip service to but in practice pursued the opposite. Communism meanwhile is actually capable of delivering the goods.
